5150 THE ZooLoctist—NovEMBER, 1876, 
subject) that “this was the only trace Mr. Stack could discover in 
the sayings of the ancient inhabitants relative to the existence and 
habits of those birds.” He then proceeds to detail, at great length, 
the circumstances under which he alleges that moa-bones and other 
animal remains had been found in kitchen middens, in what he 
terms “a moa-hunters’ encampment,” at the Rakaia, in the province 
of Canterbury, particularly noting the discovery, amongst these 
remains, “of quantities of obsidian, identical in lithological 
character with that obtained near Tauranga.” 
Tauranga, as you are aware, is in the Province of Auckland, 
and I think I am justified in asserting that no obsidian has ever 
been found, zn stfu, in any part of the South Island, or even to the 
southward of the great volcanic system in the centre of the North 
Island. 
The fact thus mentioned is, as you will find in the sequel, of very 
great importance when taken in connection with the information 
recently given to me. 
But Dr. Haast, although he mentions the discovery in this 
encampment of stone implements and other articles of apparent 
Maori origin, dissociates them, at all events throughout the papers 
published in 1871, from those which he assigns to the ‘ moa: 
hunters,” arguing, moreover, that it was not till long after the 
extinction of the moa that the encampment in question was used 
by the present race. If this fact were really well established, it 
would be a very interesting one; but a careful consideration of 
Dr. Haast’s own statements has entirely failed to satisfy me that 
he was justified in drawing the line of demarcation above referred 
to, or indeed in dissociating the Maori at all from the destruction 
of the moa. 
With respect to the mode in which his supposed moa-hunters 
killed their prey, Dr. Haast (Trans. N. Z. Inst., vol. iv., p. 86), 
says :— 
‘Amongst all the stone implements there was not one from which we 
might draw an inference how the moa-hunters killed their prey ; but, as the 
birds lived doubtless in droves, they were probably driven by men or dogs 
towards the apex of the triangle, either to be killed with heavy wooden 
implements or stone spear-heads fixed to staves, to be snared or to be 
caught in flax nets. Another method of killing them, if we assume that 
the moa-hunters were allied to the Australians, may have been by the use 
of the boomerang, or a similar weapon, to be hurled at their prey.” 
